Part 4 (1/2)

Tilly put s.e.x into another corner. So it went, with Bane selecting a variety of terms, she only one. There they touched their lighted sides, and the chosen square] appeared: PILLOW-FIGHTING.

”Oh, d.a.m.n!” Tilly swore. ”You cheated!”

”I thought I would surprise thee,” he said, somewhat lamely. He had picked randomly again, but was just as glad it hadn't finished with the word she so evidently desired. It was not that she was unattractive, but surely such a thing was no game between strangers!

”You surprised me,” she agreed. She smiled. ”You surprised me when you even agreed to play! You never gave me a tumble before, you know.” Then she c.o.c.ked her head at him. 'Thee?”

Bane realized that he had made an error of language. The girl had consistently used ”you.” That was evidently the way they spoke, here. In perpetual plural.

He smiled. ”See? Surprised you again.”

She pursed her lips. ”You are different today! Doris must have made you flip out.”

She had mentioned that he had been ”dumped” by a ”cyborg.” Was that a description of another person? If so, it must be Doris. So he-or at least Mach-was suffering from a romantic separation. And Tilly was eager to step in to take Doris' place. a.s.suming he had interpreted the signals correctly. But how did this game of patterns of words relate?

”Well, come on, robot,” she said. ”You want pillows, I'll give you pillows! I'll knock you into the muck!”

She led the way to another chamber. Bane followed, glad to let her maintain the initiative. He believed he knew what pillow-fighting was; it was a favorite game in Phaze. He had played many physical and mental games, and become quite good at several, including this one.

He was correct. This chamber was a huge muddy pit, with a heavy pole crossing it from side to side. A walkway around the edge provided access to the far side of the pole. A number of solid pillows were suspended from hooks near the entrance.

They each took a pillow. Bane made his way to the far side of the pole, then hiked himself onto it. Tilly did the same from her side.

How serious was this supposed to be? Tilly was about his own size, as he was small for a male, but she ma.s.sed less because of the difference in proportions. He surely could knock her off the pole if he wanted to. But why dump a lovely young woman into the mud? He would have to take his cue from her, again.

They worked their way toward each other until they met in the center. Tilly grinned. ”Dump or get dumped!” she exclaimed, and swung her pillow at him in a great circle.

Bane ducked his head, and her pillow pa.s.sed over his head. Such a miss could cause a person to overbalance and fall untouched, but she was experienced; she simply continued her swing in a full circle and came at him again, bopping him soundly on the shoulder. Her proficiency caught him by surprise.

Bane started to fall. To restore his balance, he had to swing his own pillow hard. He caught her on the side of the head with a loud and harmless smack. But already she was swinging again, aiming for his face-and when he ducked, she brought her pillow down to score anyway.

This was fun! Apparently it was to be a real fight; she wanted to bop and be bopped. He whipped his pillow about in a confined arc, scoring on her bosom.

”So that's the way you want it!” she cried gleefully. 'Take that, machine!” And she whammed him on his own chest.

The contest turned out to be about even. Tilly was good at this, and kept her balance, and had surprising endurance for a woman; she did not seem to be tiring at all. Neither was he; in fact he wasn't even breathing hard.

Breathing hard? He wasn't breathing at all! He had been taking breaths only when he talked.

Stunned, Bane forgot where he was. Tilly caught him with a powerful whomp, and he lost his balance and spun down. He dropped into the mud below, chagrined.

But almost without pause, she dropped too. ”I beat you, robot!” she cried, and smacked him on the ear with a handful of mud.

”Hey!” he protested. He scooped up some mud himself and dropped it on her fair hair.

”Oh, yeah?” she exclaimed with zest. 'Take that!” She flung herself upon him, bearing him back into the muck, her body literally plastered against his. Their heads sank under the surface, but it seemed to make no difference; he felt no suffocation and his eyes did not smart.

He tried to extricate himself, but she held him tight, her face rubbing against his. There was mud on her mouth, but that didn't stop her; she jammed her lips against his for a kiss.

Bane would have found all this far more intriguing if he had not been distracted by his discovery. How could he not be breathing, yet feeling no discomfort? That was impossible!

”Come on, react!” Tilly said in his ear. ”Invoke your pa.s.sion circuit, and we'll do it right here!”

Pa.s.sion circuit? She referred to him as if he were some kind of inanimate thing like the pedestal with the magic windows. What was it called? A machine.

A machine? She had called him that, and ”robot.” Vaguely he remembered: a robot was a walking machine. His mother had mentioned one she had encountered that looked and acted exactly like a living woman, with a suggestive name, Sheen. Sheen, machine. But a good person, his mother had said.

Tilly wrapped her legs around him, hauling him in so close that the mud squeezed out between them. ”Come on, make with the self-will! Mine's all the way on! What's that cyborg got that I haven't got?”

Sheen machine. Mach machine. Circuits. Unbreathing. Tilly wasn't breathing either, except when she talked. ”We're both machines!” he exclaimed, appalled.

”It took you nineteen years to catch on to that?” she asked, sliding against him. ”But we can do it just as well as the live ones can! Let's prove it!”

Bane was rescued from his predicament by a new voice. ”Players vacate the chamber,” it boomed. ”New contestants entering.”

”Oh, plop!” Tilly said, hurling a mudball out. ”Why couldn't you have hurried, Mach?”

They climbed out, and made their way to the shower at the side, where the mud was quickly rinsed away. Then they returned to the hall.

”Let's go to my chamber,” Bane said, before she could come up with something worse.

She ran her hand caressingly across his shoulder. ”Oho! So that's why you held off!”

They walked back. Tilly knew the way, which was just as well, because Bane had lost track. Soon they stood before the section of wall he had stepped through.

”Well, say your code,” she urged him.

A code. Something he must utter, like a spell, to make the wall become porous? He had no idea what word was required. ”I-I seem to have forgotten,” he said.

”Forgotten!” she cried, laughing. ”As if a computer could ever forget anything by accident!” Then she sobered. ”But you'll not get out of it that readily, Mach. We'll use my chamber.”

”Your chamber,” he agreed numbly. So machines did not forget. How long could he maintain this charade?

She led him to her chamber, nearby. She spoke a word, and the wall fogged. They pa.s.sed through.

Her room was very much like his, small and almost devoid of decoration. Machines, it seemed, did not require many human artifacts.

”How would you like it?” Tilly inquired. ”We're private here; no limits.”

There was too much he didn't understand. Bane decided it would be better to tell her the truth. ”I must explain-I'm not what you take me for,” he said.

”Not through with Doris?” she asked. ”Look, Mach, she's so hot with that android now, you'd better write her off. She's never coming back to you. What's a cyborg, anyway, but a pickled human brain stuck in a robot body? I never did see what you saw in her. You're a robot, Mach! And not just any robot. You're going to be a Citizen one year.”

A human brain in a robot body? That sounded grotesque! ”It's not-not Doris. I don't even remember her. It's-I'm not Mach. And I think I need help.”

She eyed him. 'This is a private game, right? What are you up to?”

”I'm from another frame,” he said. ”I switched places-”

”Another frame,” she repeated. ”What do you claim you are?”